Intuitive Visualization in Meditation
May 4, 2009
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We just had a comment from someone who has a hard time with visualizations in meditation. So do I! Actually, I almost never enjoy a meditation that tells you to see this and see that. The more specific the instructions are for exactly what to visualize, the worse it is for me. As I’m working to construct the tree or light or animal or whatever it is I am to see, the guide is already on to the next image. I can never catch up and I’m so busy working on coming up with the visualization that I can’t really relax and get whatever it is I am supposed to get by seeing the image.
Though most of my meditations don’t involve visualization, I know that it can be very powerful. I do use a form of visualization in a few of the guided meditations (Intuitive Healing and Inner Child meditations are examples). I like to call what I do “intuitive visualization”. It’s what I do on my own sometimes for myself. It’s something we all do spontaneously when we daydream. I just suggest that you let something appear, such as a helper, and allow it to appear in whatever way it comes. It can be clear or vague. It may not even come as a image — it could be something felt or heard. It could come through any of the senses — touch, taste, sight, hearing, smell. Or it could just be a feeling sense. A helper, for example, could just be an energetic “presence”. This way of visualizing, which perhaps would be better called “intuiting”, works best for me and I like it in general because it allows you to draw on your own inner, creative resources to come up with just the perfect thing for you.
I know the other kind of visualization meditation, or imagery as its often called, works well for some people. What about you? What works best for you?
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2 Responses to “Intuitive Visualization in Meditation”
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Good point! Actually, this is why the chakra meditation from your podcast is my favorite one among many others. In many meditations of this kind the voice in my earphones goes like “and now you should see a rotating ball of some color, and this ball gives you a sense of something”… which totally distracts me, because I have to force seeing something which is not made by my own intuition and imagination! Your podcast is not like that, and, I’m sure, many listeners do appreciate that
Thanks for your comment, Ad_Astra. In addition to being easier, it seems like it’s so much more effective to let the visualization come from within ourselves. I think it helps develop the intuition. And reflecting more on this I also see that we are in different states each time we meditate and so the visualization that comes would be different each time and related to what we need at that time.